Pruett, Taylor On Pole At The Glen

Scott Pruett took his first Daytona Prototype pole position in two years and Jordan Taylor claimed the Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen GT pole for the second consecutive year in Saturday’s qualifying sessions at Watkins Glen International.

The race, which is Round 8 of the 13-race 2012 GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series and the second round of the three-race North American Endurance Championship presented by VISITFLORIDA.com, starts at 11:00 a.m. ET on Sunday and will be broadcast live by both SPEED television and MRN Radio.

In the final moments of the 15-minute Daytona Prototype session, Pruett turned in a time of 1:41.309 (120.818 mph) to knock Antonio Garcia off the pole and take the TOTAL Pole Award for himself in the No. 01 TELMEX BMW/Riley. It was Pruett’s first pole since also taking the No. 1 starting spot for the 2010 Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen.

“It’s great to be back,” said Pruett, who shares the DP points lead and the No. 01 machine with Memo Rojas. “It’s certainly been a long time for us at TELMEX/Ganassi. It was all we had. We wrung every little ounce we could out of the car.”

Garcia starts second in the No. 90 Spirit of Daytona Racing Corvette DP he is sharing with Richard Westbrook and Oliver Gavin after a best qualifying time of 1:41.599 seconds (120.474 mph). Joao Barbosa qualified third at 1:41.667 (120.393 mph) in the No. 9 Action Express Racing Corvette DP. Barbosa’s co-driver is Darren Law.

Driving a different car but the same make and model as last year, Taylor took the GT pole with a time of 1:50.794 (110.475 mph) in the No. 75 Stevenson Auto Group Chevrolet Camaro GT.R. Taylor – who switched to Stevenson’s No. 75 entry from the No. 88 Autohaus Motorsports Camaro, which is not competing this weekend – will co-drive with Matt Bell and Ronnie Bremer.

Frank Stippler gave the new Audi R8 GRAND-AM its best qualifying run to date with a second-best GT time of 1:51.018 (110.252 mph) in the No. 52 APR Tuned/Audi Sport Customer Racing Audi R8 GRAND-AM. Stippler’s co-drivers are Dion von Moltke and Marc Basseng. Qualifying third was GT points co-leader Emil Assentato at 1:51.158 (110.114 mph) in the No. 69 FXDD Ferrari 458 Italia he is sharing with Jeff Segal and Anthony Lazzaro.